She turned a little red and quickly glanced down the hall. Our mother was still talking, oblivious. She sighed, and gave me a sidelong glare. “So?”
It was my turn to sigh, and I went back to the fridge for a beer. Since our father passed away the year before, my sister and I did our best to visit our mother on the weekends that we could spare. Sometimes it was just me, sometimes it was just her, but sometimes it was both of us. And, I’m sad to say, the times my mother was on the phone were those few occasions we had to both see and talk to each other freely. I tried not to see Monica outside the house if I could help it.
I had to. I couldn’t help myself otherwise.
I handed Monica a beer and we sat on the couch together. “I’m trying to live a normal life,” I said.
“I don’t want a normal life,” she said. “Or no. Forget that. Who said it can’t be normal?”
“Just about everybody, Moni.”
She made a rude noise and set her beer on the table. She took mine and set it next to hers. Then she grabbed the back of the couch and threw her leg over my hips. She straddled me. “Mon!” I started.
“Shut up,” she said, her manicured finger against my lips. She pushed her chest against my face, rubbing her crotch into mine. “I want this, and I’m not afraid to tell you that. You haven’t let me talk about this for a year, but I’m tired of pretending I don’t want you.”
“It would break mom’s heart,” I said simply.
“So mom doesn’t have to know,” she said, still gently rubbing against me. “Stephanie doesn’t have to know either.”
Sure, she was right. But it wasn’t how I wanted it. I wanted to live my life and have Monica, and not have to worry about keeping secrets. That’s what I wanted.
And, somehow, Monica knew this, knew all of this without me saying it. Her face softened from its tranquil fury to gentle understanding. “We don’t know anybody in the Valley,” she said. “Not too many people, anyway. You wouldn’t have to leave your job.”
“You’ve really been thinking about this,” I said.
She sighed, then she swung her leg away and sat down next to me. She gave a bigger, more dramatic sigh, and pushed her head into my shoulder. “I was really horny when this all started, and now? It’s like I’m a nun. Except when I see you. When I see you, I remember everything we’ve done, everything you said to me, how you never judged me, how giving you were, what you let me do… I’ve tried, Johnny. I’ve really tried putting it behind me. Maybe I could if you really didn’t want this. But I know you do.”
I put my hand on her shoulder. She laid her hand over mine. There wasn’t much more to say on the subject. I’d put off that conversation for a year, and nothing had changed.
Monica wasn’t desperate. She never called me in the middle of the night to come over to her place across town (though often I dreamed she did). She’d given me my space ever since I told her I was dating Stephanie two years ago. We saw each other on those weekends, perhaps once in a while when Steph and I would meet up with whatever guy she was dating at the time. But she didn’t push it. If I was going to try to live a non-incestuous life, she would too.
But Monica knew what she wanted; she always had. And she was honest about it, which I couldn’t really say of myself.
I did my best not to think about it, and had it been up to me, I probably would have spent the rest of my life “not thinking about it.” But then I found myself hosting a dinner party at a very inconvenient time, and the life I knew went right out the window.
* * *
Brodie Nash was an old friend of mine from high school. He also happened to be filthy rich – by virtue of his father being exponentially richer – and as fate would have it, his father had entrusted him with “revitalizing” a historic building in downtown. It was the first real job Brodie was entrusted with after dropping out of school. Now that Brodie was married (to Elaine Bringham, also from money, also very Catholic), it was the opinion of his combined families that he should do something with his life. Thus far, the most Brodie had managed to do with his life was get Elaine pregnant and star in a very entertaining viral video about how not to drive while intoxicated. The downtown revitalization was an attempt to rebuild the Nash/Bringham image, and Brodie’s father was very insistent it go off without a hitch.
I mention all of this because it was my personal connection to Brodie that may have influenced his decision to contract my firm for the project. I rarely worked the public relations side of things, but my firm was understandably adamant that I work this one to the hilt.
Which is why I shouldn’t have been surprised when Brodie called me one afternoon to ask if I’d mind hosting a small dinner party for he and his wife and the project manager. But I was surprised, so I asked if this particular dinner hadn’t already been planned by one of our PR people at the home of my company’s CEO.
“Yeah,” said Brodie, his voice trailing off the receiver. “But he’s a tool. You’re cool. So let’s have a few drinks and get my wife off my back for a few hours.”
To which I said, “Sure, Brodie. Anything for you.”
Now I had a problem. I – as most of my friends and family will tell you – am a terrible cook. As far as take-out goes, I had that covered, but my boss (who called me into his office immediately after I hung up the phone) made me promise to treat Brodie to something home cooked. In other words, “make an effort, and make him see the effort.”
Had Steph been with me, she might have known what to do. My ostensible girlfriend was not much of a cook either, but she at least knew how these things were supposed to go (she was very good at the whole networking game). But Steph was up in NorCal working with OxFam or the Red Cross and wasn’t supposed to be back until tomorrow.
In his office, my boss gave me a helpless grimace. “You think you can get him to sign tonight?” All we needed was one final signature and we were set. I’d been working on the plans for the ground floor refurbishment for the past week, but I had no idea who on the Nash side had actually seen them. Moreover, that wasn’t my job. Me and my department were the brains; the rest of the company was for greasing palms and signing papers.
“Absolutely,” I said.
“I know Stephanie’s out tonight. You know someone who can cook?”
“I… do,” I said.
“What?” His forehead was actually wet with perspiration (Mr. Thompson was a nervous man in general, but this project was worth more money than a quarter of our projects last year). “Why you say it like that, Johnny? He a lousy cook?”
“No, she’s…” Hoo boy. “She’s really fucking good.”
“Oh!” Mr. Thompson wiped his forehead. “Thank Christ for that. Little bit of the culinary spark in her?”
“She did a few years as a line supervisor and a caterer at the Hilton.”
“Holy shit!” said Mr. Thompson. “Yeah! Grab ‘er! Get ‘er! That’s perfect.”
“Yeah, but-” I started.
“But nothing!”
“…’kay.”
He gave me the rest of the day off to get ready. I had about four hours.
I took a deep breath in the parking lot, leaned against my car, and dialed Monica’s number. “Hey,” I said when she picked up.
“Hi,” she said.
“I need to ask you… for a favor.”
I heard movement, shuffling, and then tried not to imagine her grinning into the receiver. “Oh really…”
“Yeah,” I said. “I have about three hours to make dinner for a client. It’s not really something I do, but-”
“Is it for Brodie?”
“Yeah,” I said.
She laughed.
“Don’t laugh.”
She laughed some more. It was like tinkling bells being blown up her nose. I loved that laugh.
“It’s not funny,” I said.
“He’s such a prick. He probably thinks you guys are gonna hang out and talk about old times.”
“Yeah, well, if I’m lucky. Look, I just need to make something for him and his wife and maybe one or two other people-”
“And you-”
“And me, I guess. I wouldn’t have bothered you but you actually know how to do this.”
“I do,” she said, as if realizing this for the first time. “What about your happy little homemaker?”
“Steph’s busy.”
“Uh-huh,” she said. “So you need your amazing little sister to swoop in and save the day.”
“Yes, Mon. But look, no funny business.”
“Oh no,” she said. “Certainly not.” I heard her moving around and then the sound of her writing. “I remember what Brodie likes. I can make a fancy stir fry with some wine and some other appetizer things. Oh, and the favor you owe me is in addition to what this is going to cost.”
“I’ll reimburse you,” I said.
“Yep,” she said. “No sweat. I’ll pick this stuff up and be at your place in an hour. That’s two hours to cook… should be fine. Don’t worry, Johnny.”
“Thanks, sis.”
She hung up, and for almost an hour I was sure everything would be fine.
* * *
As soon as I opened the door, I realized everything would not be fine. Monica had all of the ingredients ready and waiting in several grocery bags that lined the hallway behind her, and she was standing amidst them with a sweet and very helpful smile on her face. That, of course, was not the problem. The problem was that my sister was wearing an outfit that did not so much suggest French Maid as scream it in the dirtiest French possible.
My sister, all five foot nothing of her, was propped up in shiny black stiletto heels that made her well-proportioned legs look like two sticks of edible dynamite. Those legs were encased in sheer black stockings that led up to a black and white skirt that might have been classy if it was several (and then several more) inches longer. Her ample chest was pushed together and nearly bursting out of the tight, buttoned top (her cleavage could have swallowed the Spanish Armada), and her lips were a brighter shade of blood. She batted her big, beautiful eyes at me and affixed her little maid’s cap. She pushed it to a rakish angle and swept back one leg. “Well? What do you think?”